


With Souls Made of Flames

by Zippit



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Soulbonds, Soulmarks, implied previous relationship - James "Bucky" Barnes/Natasha Romanov, implied/referenced PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-08
Updated: 2017-02-08
Packaged: 2018-09-22 20:39:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9624437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zippit/pseuds/Zippit
Summary: Every now and again, an unnamed swell of grief consumes Natasha Romanoff and sends her running to ground. And every time Clint comes to find her and coax her back into herself. Neither Natasha or Clint are the biggest fans of this for differing reasons.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lostinthefire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lostinthefire/gifts).



It’s an ordinary day. Her schedule consists of a workout in the facility’s gym then a meeting with Steve to discuss refinements to the new Avengers training program. Until something nameless and familiar wraps her up in its embrace, so overwhelming, all consuming, she has to tell Steve she needs to cut out early. Her tac suit is too tight, too snug against her skin. It’s hard breathing. The air escaping from her despite the deep breaths she takes. She shakes her head as she stalks away from a confused Steve, leaving him standing by the door to his office. They have offices. She has an office. The surrealness of that simple thought makes her heart race faster. She shakes her head as she stalks into said office, closing the door firmly behind her then quickly changes into street clothes.

It’s familiar but she can never predict when it’ll happen. When it’ll sneak up on her, this vague unknowing swell of grief. Tugging on strings of memory she doesn’t have any longer, buried so deep in her soul that she can never trace the origin, never know what sets it off, just the outcome.

Natasha pulls her worn leather jacket tighter around her as she strides back out of her office, past Steve’s, and down to the garage. The jacket’s her favorite. A supple brown that accentuates the red of her hair. Comfort in the midst of her mind’s chaos. She can picture Steve with that puzzled frown of his. The one he wears when he has no idea where to start to tackle a problem. She bets he has that frown on his face right now. He wouldn’t press her about this now or even later. She never asks for anything and he’s far too polite to refuse her now. And if it was anyone but Steve he’d be tracking her from the facility on the security feeds.

She takes her bike. It’s sleek, dark, and dangerous. Nothing like she feels right now. Right now she needs the feel of wind against her face, the sensation of something more than her own thoughts. It should be easy to ground herself in the here and now, right? World class super spy. Could fool even Fury if she tried hard enough. Fooled plenty of people over the years and yet here she is running.

The stink of exhaust and the screech yell of tires and sirens does nothing to drag her out of the miasma wrapping itself around her. She heads into the city. Because being lost, being unseen, is exactly what she’s going for. She goes to ground in the mill of a million people, a million souls, that don’t understand the roiling sea of emotions inside her. It’s the glint of metal, it’s the smell of gun oil, it’s the rough drawl of something she can’t name. It’s everything. It’s nothing. Fragments. Memories of memories she can’t dredge up. For the million things her past has given her, there’s a million more it’s taken.

As she flies through the streets, she remembers how it used to be worse. It used to come more frequently. Suppressed memories bubbling up in the only way they knew how: the throat clench of grief and the needneed _need_ to leave. It was the tightness in her chest or the way all she wanted to do was curl up in the familiar warmth of a nest of blankets. The impulse is still there, lessened, but not by much. It’s why she goes to ground up on the rooftop of her favorite building in the city. There’s a sniper rifle and a bow and arrow on her back. The significance is not lost on her.

She seeks out the press of the sky, the lull of clouds, and the silence. She wants to feel like she’s an insignificant part of the universe. She’s small and insignificant in the grand scheme of things. The world still spins even up here away from the streets and the people. The world is bigger than her. The world has problems that always need solving and she has a job that’s bigger and grander and more important than her. She’s a speck in the universe struggling along like everyone else. She does a job that balances the books and maybe in some small part she matters but the world would go on without her. Someone else would step in to fill her shoes. Someone else would do the things she does and the grief that swallows her today is not unique to her.

This feeling she can’t put a memory to. The holes in her life. They leave her searching for a cause, a reason, for the emotions swirling inside her. It would be easier if she knew. If she understood what her body was grieving, why she missed this person so. But she doesn’t. She likely never will. Some secrets of the Red Room will remain hidden. 

She thought when she found Clint with the matching rifle stretched across his back that he would lay claim to the missing parts of her she couldn’t name. He was close but not enough. He slotted into some of the jagged pieces of her soul while others still remained broken. Matching bloody grins and that spark in their eyes. Alike in more ways than not and the choice he’d made that had spared her life but had only served to tangle his with hers.

She parks the bike in a garage several blocks away, a different one from the last time. She should just turn this location into a true safehouse. Infrequent as it is, she still goes to ground here more often than anywhere else. Even in a world where the Avengers exist, they’re not invincible no matter what Stark says. She tugs her gray sweatshirt hood down lower over her red hair. Sometimes she wishes she didn’t love the red as much as she does. Blonde or brunette or anything in between would make her stand out less. She tucks her hands into the pockets of her jacket, thermal layer pressed against her long sleeved shirt. The weather was cold in New York with the hint of snow lingering in the air as her breath puffs out in front of her.

The holiday season was in full swing with the frenetic rush of people needing to get presents and food and decorations. It’s simple to blend into the crowd and follow the crush of humanity along the streets. She cuts through a back alley several blocks over and slips into the back exit before making her way up to the roof. She has an apartment just a few floors below where she’ll retreat when she can stand to be confined within four walls again. But until then, she has a sheltered lee between old brickwork and new A/C units where she can watch the clouds scuttle across the sky and still be warm.

~*~*~*~

Steve calls him worried about Tasha and says she’s taken off without a word. He’s too polite to ask for an explanation but Clint knows he’s dying for one. It’s not his place to say and Steve being Steve won’t push the issue. Not now anyway. It’s not mission critical, not yet, and Clint likes the guy but sometimes he’s a real stick in the mud about things. But that’s not his main concern. Clint grabs his coat, his keys, and his wallet. There’s a few stops he needs to make along the way.

The last time Tasha got this way was before they’d thawed Steve out of the Arctic ice. The last time she’d fled to ground had been before the Avengers Initiative was ever a gleam in Fury’s eye. At least the last time Clint was Stateside and there for it. He has a suspicion some happened while he was away and Tasha never told him. It’s a private thing and even though he’s allowed to see some of it, knows the reason behind some of it, it’s still not something Tasha’s wholly comfortable with him knowing.

If he lets himself think too hard about the whys and hows, it blinds him with rage and only the slow deliberate breaths like he’s about to take a shot bring him back out of it. Tasha can take care of herself, has taken care of herself. He knows that. It doesn’t matter. The whole situation still stirs something up in him that wants to protect her and take away this pain she’s feeling. 

It’s easy enough to get into the building and headed toward the roof. Tasha had slipped him a keycard and key after he’d followed her that first time. It’s permission and trust he hadn’t expected at the time. He scuffs his sneakers against the rubberized floor of the elevator and focuses on the warmth radiating into his hands from the coffee he’s holding. There’s a bag of bagels tucked under his arm. He manages to juggle bagels, coffee, and keys as he lets himself into the apartment Tasha has here. He sets it all down on the kitchen island then hums lowly to himself as he turns on the lights and raises the heat. It’s not technically a safehouse so it’s not upkept as meticulously as all the others. 

Tasha never makes it into the apartment until she’s chilled to the bone. The first time Clint had found her here and finally coaxed her inside she’d bitched about the temperature. A quick glance around the living room shows that nothing’s changed since the last visit. The furniture’s still as tasteful as it was last time. The fake plants look a little dusty but otherwise the same. When he’d cottoned on to the fact that this was going to happen occasionally, he made a point of arranging the apartment for when she was ready for it.

He breathes deep and under the scent of fresh coffee and the earthiness of poppy seeds and onions, he smells the mustiness of disuse. He should talk Tasha into making this part of the rotation or at least one she visits more often than this. It’s nice enough they could retreat here on the regular. He nods to himself as he hears the heat kick on, throwing the scent of old dust and metal into the air.

He gathers up his bounty again then heads to the roof by the stairway access. He shoulders open the door with a grunt and spots her exactly where he knew she would be. Back against the red brick beside one of the newer A/C units, seated on blankets that had been tucked into a convenient alcove under the A/C, and legs stretched out in front of her. She has her head tilted back and her face to the chilly sun. To the eyes of anyone else, she looks like she could be sleeping. Her breathing’s a hair too regular and a little too light to be sleep. She opens her eyes as he walks toward her. He doesn’t believe for a moment that she didn’t hear him coming.

He holds out the coffee as an offering and there’s a pause where she could push him away like that first time. She reaches out and curls her hands around the coffee gratefully. He settles down next to her, providing a line of warmth against one side. She’s tense, unwilling to bend, even as she sips at the coffee until eventually she winds an arm through his and leans her head against his shoulder.

“Did you want to talk about it?”

“Not particularly.” She pauses. “I was starting to suffocate there.”

“Maybe you need to get out in the field again?” Tasha had excelled as an instructor, devising lessons and training programs with Steve that would put anyone’s to shame if you asked him. She expected nothing but the best from her students and while Rhodey, Sam, and Wanda may have ended up cursing her name at the end of each day, they couldn’t argue against the results she achieved.

She snorts. “I get out in the field plenty, thank you. Or don’t you remember that incident last week when Wilson utterly failed to back up Rhodes and they both ended up in the infirmary for a few days.”

Clint hides his laugh poorly and gets an elbow in the ribs as a result. “Aww, Tasha, cut them some slack. They’re both career military. Sometimes the hoorah gets to their heads.”

“They’d be offended you got their branch of service utterly wrong.”

Words and snark are a good sign she’s coming back out of her head. A few hours on the rooftop followed by a few hours with him was the best remedy for her restless grief. There wasn’t another word for it but grief. It frustrates them both that they can’t name the source or the whens or whys. They both assume it’s tied to the sniper rifle on both their backs. Clint hasn’t dared ask Tasha if she’s done any digging into whose mark has branded them both. He’s done some of his own in the little downtime they have but there weren’t exactly books detailing the marks of the everyday person.

He presses a kiss to the red curls leaned against his shoulder and pulls his arm free to wrap around her shoulders. She sighs softly and sinks into him. He reaches for the edge of the blankets and tugs it over them both. The sounds of the city fill the air around them: the low murmur of too many voices, the vroom roar of cars and trucks, and the underlying hum of power lines and the vibrancy of life. He doesn’t know how much more time Tasha will need but he’ll be right here until she’s ready.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Round 2 of ChocolateBox
> 
> I hope you enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it. I finally combined one of my favorite tropes, soulmarks/soulbonds, with one of my favorite pairings, Clint/Natasha, along with some implied backstory. Thank you for giving me a reason to show this little universe of mine to the world. :)


End file.
